Will this stall PM’s strategy for Brexit?

THERESA May’s Brexit strategy was plunged into doubt last night – 11 days before formal talks were due to begin.

The Prime Minister had called a snap election to secure a stronger mandate ahead of negotiations with Brussels from June 19.

She had wanted to boost the Tories’ slim working majority of 17 to smooth the departure, but last night the process looked set to become more volatile – and could even be derailed.

Even if Mrs May stays in Downing Street she could be held hostage by diehard Remainers. Opponents were expected to take advantage of the disarray to try to throw her Brexit plans off course.

David Cameron’s former communications chief Sir Craig Oliver last night predicted the result could have an explosive impact on Brexit talks.

‘The difficulty of running a country at these incredibly difficult times, with Brexit negotiations and concern about public services … it is going to be an incredibly volatile period if this [the exit poll] is true,’ he told Sky News.

The Tory manifesto committed the party to pulling out of the single market, the customs union and European Court of Justice.

Mrs May had hoped to make it much harder for rebel Tory MPs and unelected peers to block a full Brexit. But now bitter Remainsupporters could try to challenge the mandate for the plan.

Brussels had said it was prepared to postpone the start of Brexit negotiations if Jeremy Corbyn became prime minister.

Mrs May had given the importance of having a strong hand in Brexit talks as her reason for calling the election. On the steps of Downing Street, she said: ‘ In recent weeks Labour have threatened to vote against the final agreement we reach with the European Union, the Liberal Democrats have said they want to grind the business of government to a standstill, the SNP say they will vote against the legislation that formally repeals Britain’s membership of the European Union, and unelected members of the House of Lords have vowed to fight us every step of the way.’

Sources had said the hope was to boost the Tory majority to help pass Brexit-linked laws such as a Great Repeal Bill as well as plans for a new immigration system. They said the Prime Minister was determined to avoid ‘endless back and forth’ on important issues.

But the exit poll last night suggested no party would have a majority, which would trigger a string of battles in Parliament as MPs fight over how Brexit negotiations should be conducted.

Brussels chiefs were expected to delight in any chaos on the British side of negotiations.

Mrs May last month accused EU politicians and officials of seeking to disrupt the general election and willing Brexit to fail.

Speaking after Parliament had been dissolved, she urged voters to ‘give me your backing to fight for Britain’, adding: ‘ Britain’s negotiating position in Europe has been misrepresented in the continental press.

‘The European commission’s negotiating stance has hardened. Threats against Britain have been issued by European politicians and officials. All of these acts have been deliberately timed to affect the result of the general election.’

She added that there were ‘some in Brussels who do not want these talks to succeed’.

‘Incredibly volatile’